


I Just Wanna Go Home

by parkeratheart



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: A little bit of blood, AU, AU where at the time of homecoming Natasha still works at HYDRA, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, BAMF Natasha Romanov, Chains, Crying, Electrocution, Eventual Fluff, Experiments, Fluff and Angst, Gags, Gun-Shot Wounds, Hugging, Hugs, Hydra, Kidnapped, Kidnapped Peter Parker, Kidnapping, Michelle Jones Is a Good Bro, Nat knows the Avengers but not personally, Natasha Romanov Is Not A Robot, Ned Leeds is a Good Bro, Nightmares, Not too graphic tho, POV switches between Natasha and Peter, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker Whump, Poor Peter Parker, Possibly OOC? Idrk, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Reunions, Sad Peter Parker, Sadness, Tears, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Whump, adding tags as I go, i feel bad, totally au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-10-19
Packaged: 2019-07-12 11:18:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 17,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15994097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parkeratheart/pseuds/parkeratheart
Summary: Peter’s heavy eyelids fluttered open. He thought it might have been a dream. He hoped it might have been a dream. Hell, it even felt like a dream. But it wasn’t. Peter Parker was many things, not all good things some might say, but he wasn’t delusional.HYDRA had kidnapped him.And how he was going to get out, he had no idea.ORAU where Natasha still works with HYDRA around the time of Homecoming and she discovers that the prisoner that they said they were going to take in was none other than the masked hero Spider-Man, who had ties to the Avengers.





	1. A Child

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do I realize that I already have two ongoing stories? Yes. Do I care? No.

Peter’s heavy eyelids fluttered open. He thought it might have been a dream. He _hoped_ it might have been a dream. Hell, it even _felt_ like a dream. A really really _bad one. But it wasn’t. Peter Parker was many things, not all good things some might say, but he wasn’t delusional._

HYDRA had kidnapped him. How long he was out, he didn’t know. All he knew was that they had taken him while he was patrolling and that he was now in a dark metal room with thick cuffs around his wrists. Peter tested the strength of the metal with a strong tug at them and was unsuccessful in his attempt to get them off.

 _It must be vibranium,_ he figured, slumping back against the wall. He tried to remember exactly what had happened, but that part seemed fuzzy and unreachable. The metal was cold against his bare feet. It must have still been night, since Peter’s metabolism would have most likely burned through whatever they used to knock him out quickly.

Peter started to drift off when a loud bang sent a chill down his spine and the door in front of him opened, illuminating the room. It was a cell, no more than ten feet across and down with a cheap bed shoved against the wall with a thin cotton blanket. A tiny, crappy toilet was a couple feet away from him against the wall.

A silhouette stood in front of the light coming from the doorway, clearly being female with her curvy figure and bobbed hair. Peter squinted in through the light to try to get a better look at her before she crossed the room and hauled him to his feet.

Peter let out a confused yelp and strained against her grip, but she remained a firm hold and dragged him for the door. “Don’t fight or you’ll get zapped,” she warned, and Peter realized there was something heavy around his neck and his senses just seemed to figure out that whatever was around his neck was about as cold as the floor. He looked down while being pulled out the door. It was a shock collar with a dim blinking blue light on the left side.

When Peter entered the hallway, he looked up at the woman holding him and almost was starstruck by how pretty she was. Her red hair was wavy and barely brushed her shoulders. Her green eyes were piercing in the light.

She dragged him towards a room with a black door. Peter thrashed and squirmed out of her grip, taking off. He wasn’t even sure of where he was going. Then a searing pain shot through his body and he stiffened, collapsing to the metal floor with a painful clang. He let out a cry of pain before the electric sensation let up and the woman was at his side again. “I told you,” she snarled, yanking him to his feet with much less softness then she had before. “Now behave.” Her black gloved hands grated against the bare skin on Peter’s arm. This time he let her bring him into the room. The lights were bright white and burned the teenager’s eyes, since his senses were dialed to not so much an eleven but a thirteen. He squeezed his eyes shut and was shoved into a chair and a strap locked around his chest.

His eyes remained closed as a deep ache spread through his shoulder and the world went dark.

 

 

He woke up in his cell again, and this time the lights were on. He craned his neck to look at his body. Dried blood stained his t-shirt around his stomach and shoulders where the pain was. Peter licked his dry lips. Dehydration _sucked._

“Next time don’t try to escape,” came the voice of the woman from before. She stood in the small window with her arms crossed over her chest.

“What’s your name?” Peter croaked, genuinely curious.

She laughed and rolled her eyes. “I’d even think about liking you if you weren’t here.” She gestured to the cell. “I’m Natasha. You’re Peter, correct?”

Peter remained still. He didn’t shake or nod his head. Her gaze was menacing. It was like those bright green eyes wanted to cut into his soul. “Hi, Natasha,” he squeaked. “How come I’m here?”

“You’re here because your DNA is especially interesting, and we wanted to take a good look at it,” she said in a neutral voice. “If you behave, you won’t feel a thing during our experiments.”

Peter blood went cold. “Experiments?” he whispered. _Is that what she was doing to me?_

Natasha rolled her eyes again. “What, do you think we’re just keeping you here for fun?”

 _Yes,_ Peter wanted to say but just shook his head.

“Get some sleep,” Natasha said. “You’re going to want it.” And with that, she strode away, leaving just Peter and the darkness.

He felt around on his shock collar to try to figure out how to get it off. There was a tiny hole which felt like a keyhole. The metal was uncomfortable against his skin. Peter pulled himself onto the bed and winced as his injured limbs touched it. He curled himself into a ball and thought about everyone he cared about.

 _May._ Oh god, she must be scared out of her mind. May, his aunt. The person who he cared about the most. His only living relative. The sweet and funny woman who could cheer him up and make him laugh any day.

 _Ned._ His best friend. Who he could nerd with and build LEGO sets and who was always there for him. Ned who loved Star Wars and Harry Potter and DC Comics.

 _MJ._ His second best friend. She was witty and sassy and odd, but in the best way. He adored her. MJ who was the queen of roasting and the master of comebacks. Who was always reading but seemed to follow along with every conversation around her, jumping in at the perfect times.

 _And Tony._ His mentor. His father-figure. The man who made his suit and took it away and gave it back again. Tony who chronically wise-cracked and made hilarious remarks and teased Peter until he went red. Tony who was also loving and caring and helped Peter through some of his worst days.

Peter only realized he was crying when he felt tears drip off his chin. He focused on their warmth until it disappeared and the chilliness of the cell consumed the teenager’s entire body once more. Peter brought his face to his knees and cried himself to sleep.

 

 

Natasha woke him with breakfast. At least, what she considered breakfast. Peter couldn’t identify what was on the plate. At least she got plain water for him. She had the shocking device in her hand for intimidation, reminding Peter what would happen if he decided to do anything. He downed the “food” and water quickly, hunger and dehydration slowly fading away. Natasha stood still a couple feet away, her arms crossed, watching him.

“When they said they were bringing an enhanced individual in, I did not expect them to bring in a child,” Natasha said after a while.

“I’m not a child,” Peter muttered.

“Talking back will give you a zap from anyone else,” she warned. “I’m not in complete favour of harming children for reasons that aren’t necessary, but everyone else is, so I’d watch it if I were you.”

“But you’re not me,” Peter shot back. “You’re not in this cell with a shock collar.”

“Again, watch it,” Natasha said. “That would have given you a zap.”

“When do I get to go home?” Peter said in a quiet voice, looking up at Natasha with hopeful eyes. Her expression didn’t soften the slightest bit.

“You don’t,” she replied, and Peter’s heart sank. “You stay here and you obey orders and you be a useful subject and be nice. Then you will take in the least amount of pain.”  
  
_I’ll find a way out of here,_ Peter thought positively, although he didn’t know exactly what he would have to do for that to happen. His collar would have to come off. That was the number one thing. And the cuffs. They had to come off, too. And he had to be completely off any of the drugs he was on from the experiments Natasha mentioned. Then he could escape.

Peter just nodded at Natasha’s statement. She collected all his dishes and turned for the door, slamming it behind her. Peter watched her fade from view and sighed to himself. It hadn’t even been 24 hours and he already missed everyone. He missed Tony and May most of all. Tears slipped from his eyes and splashed onto the mattress.

It wasn’t Natasha who came to get him again. He remembered her warnings and let his head hang, avoiding eye contact at all costs. The man who roughly dragged him out of the cell was strongly build. His head was shaven and a couple tattoos encircled his arms and neck and one was inked into the top of his head. Peter quickly scanned the area around him, pinpointing any doors and possible exits before he was closed into a dark room and was shoved into a chair, secured by two thick metal cuffs.

“Alright,” the man said in a gruff voice, pulling out a device. Without another word, he clicked a button on the top of the device and the electricity from the collar was sent surging through Peter’s veins and making him tense up. The last time this happened, it went away within a second, but this time it wouldn’t stop.

Peter couldn’t even cry out and painfully hot tears burned his eyes. He was going light-headed and his vision was becoming foggy. The pain finally stopped when he blacked out.

-

Natasha was not overly happy with hurting people to begin with, but she did it, because they told her to. It became a second nature to obey their commands, no matter how brutal. She had gotten fairly used to prisoners in pain and crying and said prisoners eventually dying.

What she was _not_ used to was _children_ in the cells.

So, she was quite surprised when she saw a small, brown-haired boy sitting on the floor with metal cuffs around his wrists. He looked young, younger than eighteen, which made him a minor. Natasha held her neutral face while she dragged him out of the cell and towards the experimentation room. She was not particularly looking forward to cutting open a child, but he would be sedated, so he wouldn’t feel a thing.

What she was also surprised about was how bad she felt when she had to shock him for trying to escape. His cry was loud and painful, and it was most certainly not music to Natasha’s ears, but she hauled him up and brought him to the room and sedated him. The experiments went easily. She was used to it by now: taking some DNA and blood samples.

But when she got his results, she just about ripped the page she sat up so fast. They stated facts about spider’s DNA being intertwined with his, but that wasn’t what shocked her the most.

It was his _name._

_Peter Parker._

Everything clicked together. This boy was Spider-Man, or Peter Parker, which ever you’d prefer. With her fair share of knowledge, she knew that Peter Parker had ties to Tony Stark, who also had ties to Spider-Man. She knew Tony Stark and the Avengers. Not personally, of course, but she’d helped with the Winter Soldier nonsense and some other minor HYDRA things.

Natasha had seen YouTube videos of Spider-Man and some sneaky reporters’ videos of Tony and Peter showing father-son affection for each other, mostly being hugging. It made her blood run cold. They kidnapped a child that was a member of the _Avengers._

She knew the typical feeding schedules. The prisoners weren’t supposed to consume water in the morning; only during lunch and dinner, but Peter looked so parched that Natasha managed to sneak in tap water with his breakfast. She cursed herself for sympathizing the boy but couldn’t help herself. He gave off this specific vibe that she found herself liking.

They had a back and forth banter for a little while until Peter asked her something that made her feel . . . _sad_ for him. “When do I get to go home?” he said in a small, quiet voice. She knew that no one went home, and bluntly told the boy that fact. He responded with only a nod and thinking but sad eyes before Natasha collected his dishes and headed out of the cell.

“What do we have planned for Prisoner SM15?” she asked Valentina Allegra as she deposited the dishes into the sink. Prisoner SM15 was Peter’s prisoner name, since no one wanted to call him ‘Peter’.

“We’re going to test how long he can go without passing out from the shock collar,” Valentina said with a shrug. “One of the guys are doing that,” she added with a dismissive wave of her hand.

They’d done these experiments on other prisoners, and Natasha ad to admit that she was curious as to how long they could withstand the pain and electricity. So far, the record time was 4.78 seconds.

 

 

Peter beat that record by 5.2 seconds, which was unbelievably impressive. His time stood at 9.98 seconds, by far the longest. _He’s special, no doubt,_ Natasha observed, watching the footage from the experiment. Peter stiffen up and have an expression of pure excruciating pain become imprinted over his face wasn’t pleasant to watch, but she’d seen it all before. What made him any different? She watched him finally pass out, the HYDRA agent jot something down on a clipboard, and haul him out of the room in fire-man’s carry towards his cell. Peter’s form never moved. He was out completely.

Natasha switched her attention to the security cams in Peter’s cell and watched the agent toss Peter onto his bed. He landed with a thud on his back. No agent was ever gentle with their prisoners, but for some reason Natasha wanted that one to be a little more gentle with Peter.

She visited him with a glass of water once she saw him stir.

“N-Natasha?” he mumbled, sitting up, using his hands to support him. His head flopped down, like it was painful to lift. “Whattre you doin’ here?” he slurred. His eyes were glassy and bloodshot and his face was pale. The electricity from the shock collar was undoubtably not a pleasant experience for him.

“You should drink,” she said, pushing the water through the closable gap in the cell door.

“I . . . I just . . . I just wanna go home,” he whispered, and tears ran down his face. Tears were not something Natasha was unfamiliar with. She’d seen enough to fill a bathtub.

“Do you want the water or not?” she demanded. “Because if you don’t, I’ll take it back.”

“No, I do,” Peter said, wiping away his tears and stumbling towards the door. “Th-thanks.” He gulped down the liquid quickly before pushing the glass back through the gap and Natasha took it in her hands.

She made eye contact with the boy for a split second before he looked away. “You’re through for experiments today,” Natasha decided to say.

“Okay,” Peter said softly, sitting back down in his bed. “Wh-what time is it?”

Natasha honestly had no clue. So, she turned and strode towards the paperwork room, leaving Peter with the question hanging over his head. She found out two minutes later that it was 7 in the evening. Peter’s sobs could be heard from the room. He was crying his eyes out. _No surprise,_ Natasha thought, working on some things. _He’s never getting out of here._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's the first chapter! Hope y'all enjoyed. Please give me requests and such in the comments and kudos are always appreciated. <3


	2. He Doesn't Deserve It

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoo yayy another chapter!

When Peter was awoken the following day after crying himself to sleep again, he was given breakfast from Natasha, with the water and whatever the brown stuff was. She watched him consume his meal with a blank expression on her face that was impossible to read, as hard as Peter tried.

When Peter finished, Natasha took back his dishes, placed them to the side, and opened the cell door. “Come on, time to go,” she urged, clasping her hand around his arm tightly. He knew where he was to go. He was going to be experimented on like a human lab rat. The metal cuffs around his wrists were becoming extremely uncomfortable and his skin felt burned by the constant friction.

The experiment that day was how quickly Peter’s cuts would heal, which seemed to be the one that wasn’t _that_ bad really. Peter healed very quickly, so she’d get her results quickly as well. He shuddered when he realized what he just thought. Being cut _wasn’t that bad._ The thought that he was adjusting to these conditions like this made him want to burst into tears.

Natasha ran a blade along the skin on his arm. Peter bit back a grunt of pain and refrained from flinching. But, compared to other pain he’d experienced, this was nothing. It took a couple of minutes for the cuts to heal fully and Natasha wrote something down on her clipboard. It was all scratched up with fingerprints all over it, as if it was used many times to write down results of experiments.

Peter’s heart sank at the thought of other prisoners being experimented on and how many more there were before him. How long had HYDRA been doing this?

Natasha dragged the blade down Peter’s skin on a couple more places before telling him that she was done. Peter held back a sigh of relief and plastered a neutral expression on his face.

When Peter was deposited back into his cell and his restraints were checked and tightened and Natasha turned to leave the room, Peter asked her in almost a whisper, “Can I at least say goodbye to my family?”

Natasha stopped walking for a moment, just a moment, before refusing to answer the question and exiting Peter’s eyeline. Hot tears rolled down Peter’s cheeks. That was all he wanted right now, besides escaping. He just wanted to say goodbye. To hear May’s voice again. To hear Tony’s voice again. Ned and MJ’s. The thought of saying goodbye itself made quiet sobs launch from Peter’s mouth. He buried his face into the thin blanket on the bed and sobs rattled his frame.

 _Please, just let me hear their voices again,_ he pleaded. _Please._

-

_Can I at least say goodbye to my family?_

Natasha had to admit, she was not expecting that and found herself freezing up at the request. While she trained, she tried to forget it. Surely other prisoners had asked such things. No, most definitely. Peter Parker was no different from them.

Except he was a _kid._

Something that Natasha could never have.

After peeling off the boxing gloves from her sweaty hands and undoing her hair from the tiny ponytail on the top of her head, Natasha kept an eye on Peter’s security cam footage. The boy was wrapped up in the blanket, and even with the crap quality of the footage, she could see that he was shivering and crying. Natasha forced herself to dismissively roll her eyes and turn her attention to Peter’s experiment results and what experiments Peter had in store for him the following day.

Her eyes scanned the pages for any particularly brutal experiments and satisfyingly found none. She let herself believe that she was only pleased that Peter didn’t have that much pain coming for him solely because he was a child and children shouldn’t have to go through shit like this.

Hacking was a skill that she had masterly developed over her many years of working for HYDRA and having to hack into devices frequently. She took one more look at the shivering boy wrapped up in the crappy blanket and turned up the heating in Peter’s cell, hacking into the display to make it seem like the temperature was still as low as it usually was. She turned it to a temperature that would hush Peter’s shivering. It took a moment for the heat to reach the level she put it at, but Peter stopped shivering and a huge sigh of relief went through his body.

Natasha took a quick look at the time and realized it was about time for all the lights to go out and for her to either get rest or be a spy. Either one of them she was happy with.   
  
She quickly said over the speakers, “Lights out” before flicking off the switches and the night vision on the security cams kicked in. Natasha found herself watching Peter lay down before she exited the room and headed for hers through the locked door.

 

Natasha was off duty for Peter’s experiments this day and the day after. She knew that the other agents roughly man-handled Peter much more than she did, since they had no sympathy for the boy whatsoever and treated him like a ragdoll who took in no pain. She was shocked when she found her hands clenched into fists at the roughness Peter was being shoved around at and quickly unclenched them and focused on something else rather than Peter’s pain.

-

After waking up to the pain from the experiment he just was a victim of, Natasha opened his cell and declared that it was time for him to have a shower. It would be his first shower in the prison.

She said no more and reached out to pull Peter out of the cell. Peter jerked his arm away. “I can move myself,” he snapped, scrambling to his feet.

“Watch it,” Natasha shot back, with an intensity that made Peter want to cower in a corner. Her hand locked around his forearm and yanked him out the door and into a room. “You have ten minutes. Do what you need to do,” she said before taking off his cuffs and looking him in the room.

Peter clenched and unclenched his fists, eyeing the blistered skin where his cuffs used to be and turned on the water in the shower, letting it run while he undressed. The room was dark but light enough to see. Most of Peter’s experimentation wounds had closed but the one down his stomach was still open and scabbed over.

Peter started to get into the shower but flinched back when his skin made contact with the water. Jesus, it was _freezing._ At home, Peter loved warm showers after a long day of patrolling. They were so soothing and felt incredible.

Sucking in his breath, Peter stepped into the shower and lathered everywhere with the liquid soap by his feet. He jumped when Natasha banged on the door and yelled, “Two minutes!” Peter quickly dried off with the suspiciously dirty-looking towel outside of the shower and re-dressed just as Natasha flung open the door. Peter picked up on a tiny sigh of relief from her that must have been from the fact that he was finished dressing himself.

Although Peter had just had the coldest shower of his life with plenty of water, it still felt like the number of tears he cried every night was more water than what the shower would produce. He wasn’t sure why after you cried you felt tired, like ‘oh you’re done expressing your unbelievable pain? Let’s make you tired so you can be enveloped by the darkness that is no where near as dark as your soul feels because you’re kidnapped, and you’ve been told that you’ll _never fucking get out.’_

He dreamt of Tony that night. It wasn’t much of a dream so much as a flashback, but he never wanted to wake up. It was that time when he was at the Avengers Compound with the team playing Monopoly. Clint was swearing outrageously whenever he landed on a tile he didn’t like, and Sam was just as bad. Peter was currently winning the game. It was Tony’s turn to role, and he landed on one of Peter’s properties. Peter smiled cockily and held out his hand for the money Tony had to give him. The billionaire had just rolled his eyes with a smile and slapped the paper bills onto Peter’s open palm.

When Peter woke up, he realized that it was a dream and started to silently cry into his hands. Surely if the Avengers were looking for him, they wold have found him by now. It had been a couple days at least. What if they didn’t care? What if they were happy that he went missing? No dead weight to carry around after all.

_No._

They had to be looking for him.

And they would find him.

And every part of the teenager wanted to believe that, but he wasn’t sure how.

-

Natasha watched Peter cry in his bed for a while before delivering his food to his cell. Peter took it without a word and consumed it with the same silence. Natasha watched his forlorn face which he seemingly tried so hard to hide. He obviously had some kind of dream or flashback.

“What’re they gonna do to me today?” Peter whispered once he finished. Natasha didn’t answer the question and took the dishes back from him. “If I’m gonna stay here forever, shouldn’t I at least know what’s going to happen to me?” he exclaimed.

Natasha whipped her head around to glare at him. “ _Watch_ your mouth, Peter.” She clicked the button on her device to send a quick shock from the collar into Peter’s system. The boy tensed up and yelped. “That’s the least amount of pain you’re going to get if you keep that up.”

“Sorry,” Peter whispered, his eyes welling up.

“Yeah well, don’t do it again,” Natasha said, shutting the opening on Peter’s cell’s door. And then she left Peter without an answer, even though she knew exactly what was in store for him. Since Peter was Spider-Man, the experiment was to cut open his wrists and see if that was how he fired his webs. Natasha knew that was not how it worked. He made his own webs and they most certainly did not come out of him, but no one else knew that. She made sure to check that he was to be sedated and thankfully he was.

But it wasn’t Natasha who was working on him. So, what was coming for Peter? She honestly had no idea.

-

When Peter was dragged out of his cell by the bald man who electrocuted him unconscious the previous encounter, Peter found himself wishing for Natasha. She was the only one who was at least somewhat kind of nice.

The bald man’s tattoos were especially interesting. Peter couldn’t make out what most of them were, but the one he could somewhat recognize was one of a scorpion along his neck. _I could call him Scorpion_ , Peter mused as the man dragged him through the maze of hallways in the HYDRA prison.

Scorpion held the shocking device in his free hand for intimidation, Peter assumed. Scorpion shoved him through the familiar experimentation room door and situated the teenager on the uncomfortable metal chair, cuffing his wrists and forearms to the arms of it, preventing any movement from his arms. He opened a drawer and pulled out a case with a label that seemed to be written in a foreign language. Peter’s blood went cold when he laid eyes on its contents.

Scalpels and knifes and other sharp things of all different types were neatly arranged in the case, from smallest to largest. Scorpion eyed each one with intense concentration, his eyes projecting thoughtfulness, and settled with an average sized knife.

“Do I . . . do I get, um, anaesthesia?” Peter croaked, his eyes fixed on the blade.

Scorpion turned his head Peter’s way. “No talking.”

Peter’s heart started to race when Scorpion neared him with the knife. “Please!” Peter cried, straining at his bonds, feeling bruises begin to form where the cuffs held him in place. Peter’s breath grew heavier with each step Scorpion took towards him. Peter needed to be frozen if they were to do anything. He couldn’t be cut open without any sedatives.

“You just ruined all your chances of it,” Scorpion sneered and turned Peter’s arm over to reveal his pale under-arms and lowered the blade towards the inside of his wrists. Sweat ran down Peter’s forehead in thick beads and he struggled against his restraints some more, wriggling his arm around, desperate to keep the blade away from his skin.

At first, the adrenaline coursing through his body like acid numbed the pain in his wrists. Then Scorpion dug the blade further into his wrist and a searing pain shot through it and hot liquid snaked down Peter’s arm. He squeezed his eyes shut and screamed, as if that would silence the pain at all, but it didn’t. Tears burned his eyes as another line was drawn through his wrist and another scream of pain came from Peter’s mouth. This hurt worse than when the Vulture had dug his talons into his chest. Worse than when he was crushed by concrete rubble.

He could feel his flesh being pulled open and his head began to swim from all the pain. Once Scorpion was finished with inspecting his wrist, sharp pricks stabbed into his skin around the wound and his skin started to pull together.

Peter finally passed out, and he’d never been more grateful.

-

“No,” Natasha said out loud, watching the footage of Peter’s experiment. Why wasn’t he being given sedatives? The HYDRA agent neared him with the sharp blade in his hands and Peter cried out a pained, _“Please!”_

Her fists clenched when the agent snarled, _“You just ruined all your chances of it.”_ Natasha covered her mouth with her glove-clad hands as she watched the inside of Peter’s wrists get a blade sliced through them. Peter writhed and screamed in the chair. His wounds were sloppily stitched by the agent, so he wouldn’t bleed out before his other wrist was cut open. Natasha felt herself exhale a little when the boy passed out. She felt around for the experiment file to her left, her eyes glued to the computer screen.

When she made contact, she flipped through the file until finding the section on this day’s experiment, and it very clearly stated that Peter required sedatives, and he did not get any. Natasha slammed her fist down on the table and scowled, making the computer mouse lift the table for a moment.

She strode off down towards Peter’s cell and opened the latch to get a glimpse of the boy. He was still unconscious, thankfully. He was haphazardly tossed onto his bed and his brows were furrowed in his sleep. Natasha’s eyes drifted to his stitched wrists. One of his arms was squashed under his body, which would lead to a very painful wound if he didn’t roll over.

Cursing herself for the sympathy, Natasha opened the door and rolled Peter onto his back, so he wasn’t lying on his wound anymore. He made a small noise and Natasha twitched. She brought her hands away and exited the cell, closing the door quietly behind her.

She took one last look at Peter before walking off to find the agent who didn’t sedate Peter and found him cleaning up the dark crimson blood in the experimentation room.

“What the _hell_ was that?” she demanded, and he looked at he with a bored expression.

“What?” he said, mopping up the blood with a grey cloth.

“The file said that you needed to give him anaesthesia!” she exclaimed, jabbing her finger at the file on the table. The white paper had tiny speckles of red littered over it.

“He was annoying me,” he shrugged. “What do you care anyway?”

“He’s a fucking child,” she said. “And the file said—”

“What are you gonna do about it?” he snapped, standing in front of her with his arms crossed and the cloth strewn over one arm.

“Next time you want to do an experiment, do it right,” Natasha hissed before storming out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

She went to her room to punch the punching bag before she lost it with anger, completely unbothered to put on gloves. She let her anger loose on the beige coloured punching bag, wishing it was that man’s body. She wanted to punch his face in for harming a child for no reason. She wanted to break something, so she settled on smashing a glass to the floor and feeling satisfied with the smash.

About an hour later, she put her name down as the one to experiment on Peter the following day, hence that would lead to the least amount of pain for the boy. She cursed herself again for feeling sympathy. But he was a child. He was a fifteen-year-old child who did not deserve pain like that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Super super angsty lol. Next chapter comes out next week so stay tuned.


	3. Old School Spy Stuff

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yayyy another chapter!

Peter awoke to the dull ache in his wrists. The lights were already on in his cell so when he looked down, black plastic-looking stitches sewed his wounds shut. They looked basically healed with a thin crimson like. Dried blood was smeared around the wounds, making Peter feel sick to his stomach. He refused to throw up.

The memories of being cut open without anaesthesia were ones that Peter would gladly forget, but they were imprinted in his brain now and burned into the backs of his eyelids permanently. Tear streaks were dried up on his face since he passed out before getting the chance to wipe them away.

He jumped in his seat when a loud banging from the door sounded through the room and Natasha’s voice exclaimed, “Breakfast.” Peter scrambled out of the bed and stood in front of the opening in his cell’s door while Natasha shoved the usual food through it. Peter was quite hungry from his ordeal the previous day, so he downed the food and water fast.

“Thank you,” he whispered before handing the dishes back to Natasha.

She met his eyes for a moment. For a second she looked like she was about to say something, but she simply took the dishes and headed off. Peter’s eyes drifted onto his wrists. He ran his finger along the stitches and produced a grunt at the contact. His finger came back with the slightest bit of blood which he wiped on his pants.

He prayed to whatever was out there that he would be sedated for his next experiment. Nothing was worse than being cut open without anaesthesia.

His mind drifted off to May. God how he missed her. The thought of her alone was enough to bring tears to Peter’s eyes. He wanted to see her again so fucking badly. He would give anything in the world to see her again. Tears started to roll down his cheeks. They quickly turned into strangled sobs.

He absentmindedly yanked at his collar with every ounce of strength he had left, only to get a long shock that made him scream from the electric pain and collapse onto his bed. When the electricity let up, he gasped in as much air has he could take in, still feeling the pain coursing through his body.

He started to cry again.

-

Natasha flipped through Peter’s file for today, her eyes immediately drifting to the section in which it stated whether Peter would be sedated or not. Even though in her heart she knew that she’d sedate him even if it wasn’t required. She was asked to cut off the skin on the boy’s finger to see if he’d be able to stick to surfaces when formed back over, and a knot formed in her stomach. Peter was scheduled for 1:00 in the afternoon and it was currently 11:00 in the morning.

Natasha was in the middle of preparing all the things she needed in the experimentation room when the agent with the tattoos and bald head whose name she did not remember barged in.

“I’m taking over this for you,” he said in a gruff voice.

“What?” she questioned, shutting the case of sharp objects.

“I _said,_ I’m taking over this for you,” he repeated ad pointed at the door. “Go.”

“Why?” she demanded, her blood beginning to run cold.

“Because the spider tried to get his collar off after you left,” he said. “So, he needs punishment, and I’m the best person for that job. I know you won’t do anything.”

_No._

“I refuse,” Natasha snapped. “I volunteered for today.”

“If you have a problem, talk with the boss. Now leave.”

Natasha scowled and walked out of the room, her heart pounding in her chest.

She punched away her feelings in her room with the beige punching bag that seemed to be asking for punches until Peter’s experiment’s time flew around the clock and she settled down to watch the footage from it.

She immediately clenched her fists when she saw the agent manhandling him into the chair and locking him in with thick vibranium cuffs. His chest was harshly falling and rising, and he kept straining at his restraints. Natasha watched as the agent picked a long, thin knife and neared Peter with it.

Peter screamed and thrashed violently against his cuffs. When the agent was across the room and brought the knife down on Peter’s finger on the hand he pried open and scraped off the skin. Natasha clapped her hand over her mouth to keep any noises in that threatened to escape. Peter screamed and writhed in his seat, tears streaming down his face. The file said it was only one finger that would be detached of its skin, and Natasha started to relax until he shaved off the skin on each finger on Peter’s hand.

The boy was outright sobbing now. Natasha breathed out a sigh of relief when the agent finally put away the knife and closed the case. Peter’s chest continued to fall and rise, and tears kept falling down his face in an unorderly fashion.

_The poor kid,_ she sympathized. She finally stopped cursing herself for sympathizing for the kid, because that’s all he was. A kid. A kid who did not deserve this kind of torture.

He deserved to go home.

He _needed_ to go home.

So, Natasha did something she’d never done before. Never once had she helped her prisoners in any way. But none of them were children who in no way deserved it.

So, she did it.

She looked for a way to contact Tony Stark.

 

There was no cell service at the HYDRA base for obvious reasons; just ear pieces that the fellow agents would use to contact each other when necessary and surveillance footage. Natasha had created communication devices before, and she knew the location and coordinates the Avengers compound.

She thought about Clint for a moment.

Code name: Hawkeye.

Her former partner.

She pushed away the thought and got to work on constructing a communication device that could record her voice and send it off. Anything. Even Morse code if she had to go that far. Clint could decipher anything; he was smart and clever and witty. He was the last time Natasha saw him anyway.

She started with her earpiece. If she could just rewire it or reprogram it somehow to have it be connected to the ones the Avengers used, she could give them a message.  
Something.

The problem was: she had no idea what the wiring in the Avengers’ earpieces looked like or their math or coding. She’d have to send a message outside the Internet somehow. _Old school spy stuff,_ as Clint would most likely call it. She had found herself missing Clint on some lonely nights when she first joined HYDRA.

_Focus,_ she told herself, working on a device that would send a message to the Compound.

-

Peter sobbed profusely at the searing pain in his entire left hand where the skin had been ripped off his flesh. It hurt so much, more than when his wrists were cut open. The stitches in his wrists were still woven into his skin even though the wounds were completely healed over. Peter had no idea as to how to nurse his wounds. He knew they’d heal over, even though they’d probably leave some scaring. He also knew that the experiment was to see if he could stick to surfaces if the skin on his hand was cut away and healed over. The thought that he couldn’t climb things anymore itself made him cry harder.

He jumped at the pounding on the door and wiped away his tears with the back of his hand. Peter stumbled his way over to the opening in the door, the pain and bleeding and burning of his hand not letting up. He found himself exhaling a sigh of relief when he saw that it was just Natasha.

She didn’t even open the latch and just walked right in, shutting the door behind her.

“I hacked the security cams and audio, but we don’t have much time,” she said hurriedly.

“Huh?” Peter questioned. “What?” About eighteen bajillion horrible thoughts went through his head. What was she going to do that she didn’t want anyone else to see? What did she have planned?

“Tony Stark,” Natasha said quietly. “I sent him a message.”

The eighteen bajillion thought were all forgotten in an instant.

“What?” Peter said, sure he had misheard her.

“I sent him your name and the coordinates of this place,” Natasha whispered with a smile and tears of joy sprung into Peter’s eyes. “I’m not sure if they got the message yet or not, but I swear to god they’re going to find you.” Her eyes darted around as if someone was watching. “Act normal.”

“Okay,” Peter whispered breathlessly, unable to stop the flow of tears that escaped his eyes. But for once in countless times he’d cried this past week, they were not tears of pain or sadness or loss or regret. Happiness.

“Wipe the smile off your face,” Natasha said. “You’re not supposed to be happy here. But, keep crying. That’s normal around here.”

Peter nodded and forced the smile to turn into a frown, even though his heart was bursting with joy and his eyes continued to water. “Why did you do it?” he whispered to her.

“You don’t deserve this,” she whispered back. “This torture, I mean. You’re just a kid.” She looked down at a device in her hand that Peter only just noticed. “I have thirty seconds before everyone will start to get suspicious. Goodbye, Peter.” She didn’t wait for his response and exited, slamming the door behind her.

A mere two minutes ago, he was crying over the wounds on his hand. Now they just felt like tiny aches. Tony was coming. He was going to be rescued. He was going to get out of here. More tears of happiness spilled down his cheeks which he wiped away quickly despite Natasha’s advice to continue crying and situated himself on the bed, clinging to the thin blanket.

He was to be rescued.

-

Natasha couldn’t sleep at night. It’s not like she really needed sleep anyway. She occupied her boredom with Peter’s security cam footage. The boy was jittery in his bed, but who wouldn’t if they just found out they were to be rescued?

She eventually did nod off on the desk, her hand resting atop her folded arms, red hair flopping around. She dreamt of Clint during her sleep. In her dream, they were in the middle of a mission when Clint suggested getting coffee after.

Everyone hates being awoken by an alarm clock in the middle of a good dream with that annoying as hell _beep beep beep._

It’s worse being awoken by a siren that’s only supposed to be used if there is a break-in occurring. Natasha’s head snapped up from her surprisingly peaceful slumber for once.   
She checked the clock on the wall. 6:30 am.

Break-in . . .

The Avengers.

_Peter._

Natasha jumped up from her seat and sprinted towards Peter’s cell, but there were already guards surrounding it and yanking the child out of bed, straining his arms behind his back and securing them with cuffs. Peter let out a weak whimper of pain.

“What’s going on?” Natasha asked. Peter met her eyes for a second and a glimmer of hope spread through them.

“The Avengers found us,” Valentina snarled, gripping Peter’s left arm in a tight vice. “We have to evacuate and get this subject out of here.” She dug her fingernails into the boy’s arm and he winced slightly.   
_What do I do?_ she panicked.

“Go guard the doors,” Valentina ordered.

Natasha locked eye-contact with Peter for a moment. The boy’s eyes were filled with tears that threatened to spill. _I’m sorry, Peter. I’m so sorry._

Natasha looked at Valentina and gave her a nod. She pushed away the sickening feeling in her stomach and headed off to adhere to Valentina’s order. She felt her heart crack in her chest when Peter let out a pained scream of, “No!”

-

So, this was it then.

Natasha was just playing him all along. She was never going to help him. She was never going to let the Avengers come rescue him. She just wanted to see him suffer, like everyone else. The lady’s grip tightened on his arm and a strangled sob escaped from his mouth laced with pure intense sadness. He couldn’t believe he even had the slightest bit of trust in her. She was worse than everyone else. Everyone else didn’t get his hopes up at all. This was far worse than all the pain he’d taken in.

The lady dragged him into a darkish room and shoved him into a big metal chair. The back of his head collided painfully with the cold metal and he yelped in pain. The lady secured him to the chair with thick chains that she had grabbed from the dark table. Everything in this place looked evil and dark and menacing.

“What’re you doing?” Peter squeaked as the lady tightened the chains and secured them with a lock.

“Making sure they don’t find you, obviously,” she said bitterly. “Now hold still, I have to rip your sleeve off.” Peter’s shirt was royal blue with long sleeves. He loved this shirt. It was the only thing he had of home, probably for a long time, too, if what this lady said was true and what she was doing would prevent them from finding him. So, he squirmed around, but she managed to tear off the sleeve on the shirt and tears pricked at the teen’s eyes. He continued to thrash against the bonds with no success in getting them off.

He wondered for a moment what she was planning to do with this specific piece of his clothing until she quickly stepped behind the chair and gagged him with it, tying it tightly behind his head and triple-knotting it. Peter let out a muffled whimper.

“There. Now you can’t tell them where you are,” the lady said firmly. “Seeya, Spider.” And with that, she was out of the room

.  
The alarms still blared. It hurt Peter’s ears with his senses dialed to eleven, like they did when he was scared. He hyperventilated, thrashing at his bonds and grunting against the gag in his mouth, which happened to be his shirt’s sleeve.

He thrashed, remembering each name that he missed so much.

_May._

_Tony._

_Ned._

_MJ._

He eventually gave up struggling since it would only lead to more pain, which he did not need any more of right now, and slumped back against the seat, breathing heavy through his nose. Sweat trickled down his face from his hairlines in thick beads and mixed with the drying tears still on his cheeks. He hated this feeling of no control. In the cell, at least he could move, speak and cry without it being muffled, and hope. Now he’d lost all of that.

So, he started to remember. His time with Tony and May and Ned and MJ started to flash before his eyes.

_That time when the Avengers were all in a game of Mario Kart. Peter was utterly shocked at how fantastic Wanda was at it. He still beat her though, barely. Clint and Tony were also really good. Steve was freaking awful, but that was okay, because Peter got an ab workout laughing at his failed attempts._

_That time when Peter tried to double dip into May’s ice cream bowl while they were watching a movie and they started fencing with their spoons. May kept hollering Shakespearean insults Peter’s way, which gave him another ab workout from the sheer laughter at what May would come up with._

_That time when he, Ned, and MJ went to see Rogue One and were bored out of their minds the whole time. The prequels were a complete bust which made Peter mad. But they cracked up at the stupidest things ever, trying to make entertainment for themselves while the boring movie was playing. They came up with the stupidest shit in the entire world, but the movie ended up being enjoyable because of said stupid shit._

__Then he heard the clicking of the door being unlocked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ack cliffhanger!! Lol so sorry. Next chapter will be out next Friday so stay tuned <3


	4. Warmth

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one's a long one! I was stressing out trying to finish it in time, but I did it! Yayyy!

A burst of hope surged through Peter’s body. Was it Tony?

Soon, Natasha was standing in the doorway with a gun in her hand. Peter’s eyes widened, and he started to thrash against his bonds again. Natasha betrayed him and was now going to kill him. He was never going to see May or Tony again. He was never going to go to college or—

Natasha crossed the room in a swift movement and pulled something out of her pocket.

A key.

She unlocked his chains and cuffs in a matter of seconds and undid the gag in his mouth.

“Natasha?” Peter croaked once the gag was out of his mouth.

“I’m sorry, Peter,” she whispered. “I’m sorry I left you.” She fiddled with a device on her wrist and Peter's shock collar quickly popped off and he breathed out heavily. Peter reached up and gingerly touched the skin. It was tender to touch and felt like it might bleed. He wasn't shocked too much, thankfully, but enough for it to leave a mark. She helped him up from the chair, slipping an arm under Peter’s. “Come on, I’ll help you get to them.”

“Why?” Peter sputtered while Natasha lead him out of the room. Gunfire continued to echo through the place. “Why did you come back?”

“I didn’t know what to do or who’s side to take. I didn’t know who to be loyal to or if I wanted to face the consequences of one choice or the other,” Natasha said, her eyes darting around the base. “I’m so sorry for leaving you. I promise I’ll help you find your friends.”

 _They’re more like family,_ Peter wanted to say. Tony was his family. His mentor. His idol. His father-figure. “I think- I think they’re where the gunfire is sourced,” Peter observed, his heart pounding in his chest.

“Right, let’s go,” Natasha said. “Come on, hurry.” She started to sprint down towards the direction of the gunfire with Peter following behind her. His heavy footsteps made loud clangs when he ran.

 _Please,_ Peter prayed. _Please please please._

Then he heard it.

The familiar whir of the Iron Man flight stabilizers and the blasts of his repulsors.

Tony, Peter thought, the burning in his lungs turning into a thrumming of his heart. _He’s here he’s here he’s here._

Then the gunfire and replusor blasts quieted. Tears went down Peter’s face. Did this mean that they left? They left him? He started to sob, squeezing his eyes shut. He felt every inch of his body hurting. The wounds in his wrists were starting to hurt again. Fuck, _everything_ hurt.

“Peter, what’s wrong?” Natasha said, her voice dripping with worry. She turned to face him.

“They’re- they’re gone,” Peter whispered. “They- they left me!”

“No,” Natasha said, shaking her head. “No, they didn’t. Peter, they’re—"

Then the softest and gentlest voice rang through his ears. The voice of someone Peter had missed so fucking much. The voice of someone who saved Peter when he was seven and didn’t even know it was him. “Peter?”

When the person came into view, tears of joy rolled down his cheeks slowly. “Tony?” Peter whispered.

The man was quickly across the room. “Kid,” he whispered, resting his hands on the sides of Peter’s shoulders.

“Yeah,” Peter said, smiling. He wasted no time in throwing himself into his mentor’s arms. Tony instantly wrapped his around Peter’s shoulders, squeezing him tightly to his chest. Peter just realized that his hand was hurting from pressing it against Tony’s back, but he didn’t want to let go.

He prayed with every inch of his body that this wasn’t a dream. That it wasn’t one of those really good dreams that you almost start to cry when you wake up, because he never wanted to wake up if this was one of those. Tony felt completely real and all the sounds around him and the pain and happy tears . . . it was all real.

Tony was _real._

Tony had come to save him.

More tears streamed down his face one by one.

“Hey, buddy,” Tony choked out. “God, I’m so sorry.”

“I’m okay,” Peter assured. He was ungodly happy that Tony was here, but aside from that, he really wasn’t okay. He was still hurting all over and the tight hug made him hurt more, but he didn’t care about that. A little more pain just to be in Tony’s arms again was completely worth it. Tony Stark was _hugging_ him. And Peter was hugging him _back._

When Tony pulled away, Peter felt a lurch in his stomach. Tears tracks shone on the billionaire’s cheeks. Tony was most definitely _not_ a crying person. Peter reached up his hand to wipe away his mentor’s tears with the back of his hand, but Tony caught it in between his calloused ones. It was a sweet, gentle gesture, but Tony touched his wounds and Peter flinched back with a yelp.

“What’s wrong?” Tony asked, startled by the sudden mood change. Then his eyes fell to Peter’s hand and nearly popped out of his head. “Holy shit. Jesus fucking Christ. Are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” Peter said shakily, pulling his hand up towards his chest protectively. He felt tears beginning to come to his eyes again. Tony gently wrapped his hand around Peter’s arm to pull it down and inspect his wounds. Peter hesitantly succumbed to the tugging and let Tony carefully look at his wounds.

“What the hell happened?” Tony asked, turning Peter’s hand over.

“They- they just . . . experiments, you know?” He was crying again.

Tony reached up and very lightly brushed the tips of his fingers along the shock marks on Peter's neck. "And this?"

"Shock collar," Peter sniveled, his bottom lip quivering.

Tony instantaneously wrapped Peter in his arms again. “Oh my god. I’m so sorry, Peter.”

Peter clutched the back of Tony’s shirt like it was a lifeline with his uninjured hand.

Tony abruptly pulled away when his eyes landed on Natasha. “Who the hell are you?” he barked, preparing to step back into his suit.

“Natasha helped me, Mr. Stark, it’s okay,” Peter squeaked before Tony could hurt Natasha, standing between his mentor and the HYDRA agent, who was standing still with her arms across her chest. Would she be and ex-HYDRA agent? Peter honestly wasn’t sure.

“You?” Tony said, raising his eyebrows at her.

“Yes, me,” Natasha responded neutrally. “I’m the one who gave you the message.”

An expression of joy washed over Tony’s face. “Oh my god, thank you.” Natasha gave him a quick smirk. Tony turned back to Peter. “C’mon, kid. Let’s get you out of here, yeah?”

Peter smiled and said, “Yeah. That sounds good.”

Tony nodded before he looked at Natasha. “Thank you.” She nodded in acceptance with a brief smile that came across her face. “What will you do?”

Natasha rubbed her palms on her pants. “I don’t know. I betrayed HYDRA, so I can’t stay here.” She shrugged dismissively. “I’ll find someplace.”

“Well, I owe you one,” Tony said. “For helping my kid and helping me.”

_My kid._

_He didn’t mean that,_ Peter’s mind went. _He’s just absorbed in the moment._

“You better get out of here,” Natasha said with a wave of her hand.

“Peter, get in the suit,” Tony commanded. “I can get you to the jet quickest that way.”

“What about you?” Peter asked, his voice breaking. He would not lose Tony again. “I can’t just leave you here.”

“I’ll find the rest of the team, but I need you to get there,” Tony pushed, resting his hands atop Peter’s shoulders. “It’s the safest for you. I’m not going to get you get taken from me ever again, okay?”

A lone tear went down Peter’s face as he nodded. He swore he saw one travel down Tony’s face but dismissed the thought and stepped into the open Iron Man suit. Right as the metal enclosed over his arm, he felt suffocating claustrophobia.

The cuffs on his arms were back, holding him to the chair so Scorpion could rip away his skin and let him bleed onto the floor and cut open his wrists. He started to feel the blades digging into his skin and the pain in his injuries returned at nearly full force. He felt himself scream but didn’t hear anything. The pounding of his head and heart was the only thing he could hear.

“FRIDAY, open up!” someone exclaimed. They sounded male, like Scorpion. Sweat soaked his hairline before the suit around Peter quickly burst open. Peter tumbled out, swiftly caught by a pair of arms. He thrashed at the hold for a moment, forgetting who was there. “Peter, it’s just me!”

He latched onto the voice. This was a good voice. “Peter, buddy, it’s just Tony.”

“Tony . . .” he repeated and was then being hugged by the arms that held him.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Tony soothed, rocking back and forth. “You’re okay.”

Peter sniffled. If he couldn’t go into the Iron Man suit without freaking out, how the _hell_ was he going to get out of here safely?

“Just carry him,” Natasha said with disappointment in her voice.

“Right, yes,” Tony said, flustered. “I should have thought of that.”

Tony hesitantly let go of Peter before the sound of the suit enclosing over Tony’s body sounded and metal-clad arms slid under Peter’s knees and Peter’s back rested against the other arm. Tony pulled Peter tightly to his chest and Peter felt the wind whip through his hair as Tony carried him. Peter focused on the dim blue glow on Tony’s chest. The metal was cold against the bare skin on his arms, like the metal in his cell. He wanted to cry just thinking about that cell.

Peter focused on his breathing. The metal made him think of his cell, so he needed to calm down. He could start with that. _Deep breaths._

“We’re almost there, kiddo,” Tony assured just as gunfire started to sound. Peter flinched at the sudden loud noises.

Tony cursed under his breath. “I’m gonna have to put you down so I can deal with these assholes,” Tony said.

“No, don’t leave me,” Peter pleaded, gripping the metal with his uninjured hand. “Please.”

“I’m not going to leave you,” Tony whispered, landing and lowering his arms. When Peter didn’t let go, he said, “Kid, you gotta let go, okay?”

“Please don’t leave me,” Peter wheedled, slipping from Tony arms to land gently on the floor.

“I’m not leaving you,” Tony said. “I just have to deal with these guys and then we can go.”

Peter sniffed, his tears coming down. “O . . . Okay.” He pulled himself up against the wall and drew his hand to his chest while Tony fired repulsor blasts in the directions of the gunfire. The sounds hurt Peter’s ears. He covered one of them with his uninjured hand and squeezed his eyes shut, as if that would help block out the noise in any way.

While he was sitting there with his knees pulled tightly to his chest, he concentrated on calming his breathing. _In . . . out. Repeat._ That occupied this time surprisingly well, because soon enough he heard Tony’s voice, soft and in front of him.

“Okay, Pete, let’s go,” he said, sliding his arms under Peter’s knees and behind his back again. Peter instinctively grabbed a hold of the metal shoulder of the Iron Man suit and gripped it so hard he thought he might dent it.

He felt the breeze run its fingers through his hair and the cold metal against his skin.

Then Tony shouted out a strangled “Agh!” and they were both sent crashing to the ground. Tony rolled over so he’d be on the bottom when they made contact. The impact hurt, but it was nothing compared to what else he’d experienced.

“What’s going on?” he squeaked. The Iron Man suit was completely still and had its arms practically glued to its sides.

“Get the thing off me,” Tony grunted. “I can’t move and JARVIS won’t respond and I can’t get out.”

Peter’s heart started to pound when he herd footsteps from somewhere down the corridor with his dialed senses. “Tony, there’s people coming!” he exclaimed, searching the suit for whatever he needed to get off. “Where is it?”

“On my back, so roll me over,” Tony said, voice strained.

Peter slipped his hands under the suit as far as he could go and let out a cry of pain when he attempted to roll the suit over with pressure on his injured hand and jerked it back. The wounds stung.

“Peter, please, you have to do it or we’re both going to be stuck here,” Tony said, panicked. The blue glow in the Iron Man suit’s eyes and chest was gone.

“Okay,” Peter sniveled, and slid his hands under the suit again to push it over. He cried out at the pain but kept going. Hot tears burned his eyes while he forced the suit to roll over.

“Someone’s coming!” Tony exclaimed. “Please hurry.”

Peter glanced over his shoulder and saw who Tony was talking about; a cluster of HYDRA agents running at them with guns in their hands. He felt the suit moving. The searing pain continued to burn his hand, but he kept at it and eventually rolled the suit onto its stomach and ripped off the tiny device stuck to the back of the suit.

The suit’s glow quickly returned, just in time for Tony to shoot the HYDRA agents rushing them. Peter jumped out of the way, painfully clanging his back against the wall.

 _Help him somehow, Peter,_ he thought, frantically searching around for a way to help his mentor. Pieces of the Iron Man suit were chipping off under the impact of the advanced guns that were being fired.

Then Peter felt a searing pain shoot through his arm and cried out. Tony’s head turned just in time to get a bullet to the back of his metal-clad head and the sudden force made him stumble. Peter looked down at the pained area in his arm and his heart sank.

_He’d been shot._

A growing red spot was sitting on his arm, the arm that had no sleeve. Blood trickled down his skin slowly, like corn syrup. He breathed heavy and clasped his hand around his arm in an attempt to stop the bleeding. The turned his arm over and raised his fingers to see if there was an exit wound, and thankfully there was. A hole equally sized to the entry wound.

“Peter!” Tony shouted, blasting the last of the HYDRA agents to the ground. He rushed to the teenager’s side, stepping out of his suit. “Jesus, kid. Are you okay?”

“I think so,” Peter said, voice strained. “Just . . . just hurts.”

“No shit, Sherlock,” Tony said, stepping back into his suit and collecting Peter into his arms again before collecting Peter into his arms. Peter continued to grasp his wound, gritting his teeth at the pain.

“Is it supposed to hurt this much?” Peter choked out while in the air.

“I’ll get you to Bruce,” Tony said, so yeah, they were supposed to hurt this much.

The ride there was quick and easy, and they closed the distance in very impressive time. Peter saw the Quinjet in the small distance ahead and was soon inside of it on a bench. No one else was in there, which made Peter start to panic. Had everyone else not gotten out?

“Where is everyone?” Peter asked Tony while the man rummaged through the contents of a box. “Did they not get out?”

“I didn’t get anything from them on the comms,” Tony said, pulling out a clean washcloth and gently pressing it over Peter’s wound and he winced at the contact. Tony’s eyes drifted to the non-existent skin on Peter’s hands. “Oh god, What did they do to you?”

“I’m okay,” Peter insisted.

Tony sighed and pulled Peter into his chest. The teenager wrapped his free arm around Tony’s shoulders and tucked his face into the spot between Tony’s neck and shoulder. He suddenly wanted to cry. He was going home. He was _leaving this place._

Tony carded his fingers through Peter’s hair, keeping him pulled to his chest. The wounds all over Peter’s body were throbbing. Tony reached over to the washcloth and gently tie it around the wound so Peter could have two arms free. Peter instantaneously moved his other arm around Tony’s shoulders.

Some time later, the Avengers piled into the jet, breathing heavy. “Peter!” Steve and Bruce exclaimed in unison. Peter was quickly wrapped up in a huge hug from Steve. With his massive size, his hugs were _great._

Peter heard the jet starting to fly just as he heard Tony’s voice go, “As adorable as this is, Bruce, can you take a look at the kid?”

“Sure,” Bruce said, ushering Peter to sit on the bench. His eyes immediately locked onto the bullet wound that currently had a washcloth tied around it to help cease the bleeding. “Jesus, did you get shot?” He ruffled around through a first-aid kit.

“Yeah, but I’m okay,” Peter said.

“Yeah, so you’ve said,” Tony muttered as Bruce carefully undid the washcloth and tossed it aside.

Bruce rotated Peter’s arm to check for an exit wound and a small sigh of relief came from him. Then he saw Peter’s hand. “Oh my god! Peter! What the hell happened?”

“Um . . . just . . . um, experiments,” Peter whispered, his eyes welling up. Bruce cleaned off the wounds with a cotton ball and rubbing alcohol. A stinging surged through Peter’s hand and he let a couple of tears run from his eyes. He was done trying to hide his pain. He’d done that already too much.

He hardly noticed Tony cross the jet to sit next to him until he placed a calloused hand on Peter’s shoulder and rubbed circles. Peter curled into the touch. He missed this so much.

Peter noticed after a little while of Bruce tending to his wounds that Clint was uncharacteristically quiet. He was sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall with his hands half against his mouth and his eyes were blank.

“Clint, are you okay?” Peter asked innocently, looking in his direction. Bruce moved to bandaging everything up.

“Yes, Peter, I’m fine, are you?” Clint retorted in a snarky voice.

Even though he couldn’t see him, Peter knew Tony was theatrically rolling his eyes.

Bruce finished helping Peter and taped down the edges of the bandages, Peter threw his arms around the scientist. “Missed you,” Peter said, his voice muffled by Bruce’s blue shirt.

Bruce returned the embrace. “Missed you, too.” His voice wavered.

Peter was just about to ask if Bruce was crying, because damn it sounded like it, when Tony jumped in with basically the same sentence. “Okay, Brucie, no crying,” Tony snorted.

“Says you,” Peter said with a sassiness to his voice that he had missed being able to use. Sassiness would lead to electricity coursing through his veins in the cell that he wanted to erase from his memory so fucking badly.

Was that a moment of hesitation from Tony Stark? “Well you know what Peter?”

“What?” Peter challenged with a smirk, letting go of Bruce.

“He loves you like his own son,” Steve interjected. Tony shot him a look, but he continued. “And fathers are allowed to cry over their sons,” he finished, smiling.

Tony just rolled his eyes.

 _God, I missed this,_ Peter thought, looking at everyone. But his thoughts drifted back to Clint. _What is up with him?_

Some time into the ride, Peter slid down next to Clint, who hadn’t moved from his position, hugging his knees to his chest. “Hey, Clint,” Peter said softly, desperately wanting to hug Clint out of his weird mood, but he wasn’t sure if Clint was a huggy person.

“Hi, Peter.”

“Um, you wanna tell me what’s bothering you?” Peter asked hopefully, widening his eyes innocently.

“Don’t give me the puppy eyes,” Clint scoffed, rolling his eyes dramatically.

“Please?” Peter tried. “It’ll make you feel better.”

Clint sighed. “I just ran into my former partner from SHIELD. Nothing you have to worry about.”

“That’s what you guys were doing when Mr. Stark was helping me,” Peter said.

Clint sighed again and shook his head. “I really missed her when she left SHIELD.”

“I’ll bet you did,” Peter said. “How close were you guys?”

“Best friends,” Clint said flatly.

“What was her name?” Peter said.

“What is this, 20 questions?” Clint snapped, and Peter flinched. “I’m sorry,” Clint said softly. “Her name was Natasha.”

Peter froze, and his blood ran cold. “Natasha?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So there was no Natasha's POV in this one, but there will be some of hers in the next chapter. thx for reading, lovelies <3


	5. Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, school really has taken a chunk out of my working time. I finished this chapter just today and I was so happy when I did. As you can see, i was originally going to have this only be a 5 chapter story, but there's so much I want to get down so I was like "ah screw it, we can do six chapters."
> 
> Enjoy ;)

The words hit Peter hard, heavy like freight train.

_Natasha?_

She worked at SHIELD?

_That’s_ why she helped him, because Clint was her former partner.

“Yeah, Natasha,” Clint said, a confused expression on his face. “Why, you know her?”

“She . . . she was the one who sent the message to Mr. Stark,” Peter said softly, tears pricking at the sides of his eyes. He wasn’t even sure what they were for. Everything just felt like it should be cried over. “She . . . she saved me.”

“Wow,” Clint breathed. “I guess she’s not all bad then.” His eyes went to Peter’s bandaged hand. “Did she do that?” he asked, gesturing it with the flick of his finger.

“No,” Peter said, shaking his head and subconsciously pulling that hand towards his chest. “No, this was . . . someone else.” _Scorpion,_ his mind continued, and Peter shuddered. Those images he’d gladly love to erase from his memory.

A couple of minutes later, Peter stood up from Clint’s side and crossed the jet to sit with Tony, who instantly wrapped Peter in a hug. He buried his face in Tony’s chest and curled into the embrace, a warm soothing feeling washing over him.

“I missed you,” Tony whispered. “God, I’m so sorry we couldn’t get to you sooner.”

“It’s okay, you’re here now,” Peter said, tightening his grip.

When they released, both males had tears brimming in their eyes. Peter pulled his knees in to his chest and leaned against Tony. His mentor put his arm around Peter’s shoulder and drew him in closer.

“Did you find out what’s up with Clint?” Tony asked quietly.

Peter nodded. “Yeah. It turns out Natasha was his partner in SHIELD and he ran into her.”

“Damn,” Tony said. “Everyone in this team has issues.”

Peter barked a laugh.

When they landed at the Compound, Peter almost sobbed in relief. The smell, the warmth, the fucking idea of being back.

Then he remembered.

_May._

“Mr. Stark, when do I get to see May?” he asked, looking at Tony with wide eyes.

“I just called her,” Tony said, holding up his phone. “She’ll be here soon.”

Tears built up in Peter’s eyes again and he nodded.

“Peter,” Tony started. “Come to the Medbay, please, Bruce has to check your injuries.”

Peter nodded again and followed Tony into the white room and plopped down in the plushy white bed. Bruce was fiddling with some stuff that Peter couldn’t identify.  
  
“I’m going to leave now, is that okay?” Tony said, raising his eyebrows. Peter gave him a reassuring smile and nodded. Tony turned on his heel and strode out of the Medbay.  
  


"The shock burns on your neck will heal completely," Bruce said with a smile. "So, that's nothing to worry about. I'm going to start by treating your more serious injuries, okay?"

"Mkay," Peter said.

Bruce first started on Peter’s gunshot wound. He elevated the arm and gently peeled away the bandage that was temporarily supposed to be there. He cleaned off the wound again, since some blood had escaped and gave it three stitches to sew it up. Peter gritted his teeth as the needle sunk into his skin and had to look away. Painful memories crowded in his mind from when his wrists were cut upon.

Wait.

“Bruce?” Peter squeaked and the scientist’s eyes flicked to him. “I- I think there are still some stitches in my wrists from- from a . . . a thing.” He sputtered because his mind kept going back to that horrid day.

“Just let me finish here,” Bruce said gently, wrapping another bandage gently around Peter’s arm. He wasted no time in examining Peter’s wrists. “The wounds are completely closed, so I can remove these now,” Bruce said, grabbing a pair of tweezers and some long thin scissors. He carefully pulled up each knot, slipped his scissors under the opening and clipped the stitch. Bruce gently pulled out the stitches like a magician producing a scarf.

“Thank you,” Peter said with a watery smile. He had to admit, the stitches being out did feel pretty good.

“I’m just going to look at your hand, okay?” Bruce said. Peter nodded and let Bruce softly take Peter’s hand in his own and pull away the bandages. Peter winced at the sight and forced himself to draw his eyes away from the raw flesh. Bruce cleaned them off again and dressed the wounds carefully with another bandage that he secured with white medical tape.

“Are we done?” Peter asked softly.

“Yep,” Bruce said. “The bandages are waterproof, so you can shower fine. Try not to do too much with your hurt arm until the wound has healed,” Bruce lectured. “Avoid using your hand for a while too, until the skin grows back.” The scientist sighed. “Peter, there will be some fairly intense scarring, but that’s not what worries me the most.”\

“What?” Peter said, his heart sinking.

“I’m not sure if you’ll be able to stick to things after the skin has regrown,” Bruce said slowly. A weight dropped into Peter’s stomach. “Obviously I wouldn’t know for sure, but with the damage to your cells being that harsh and the skin being torn away like that, there’s not very good odds.”

“But- but I can’t be Spider-Man if I can’t stick to stuff,” Peter said, his eyes wet with unshed tears. “The people need me! I can’t just . . .” He trailed off and pressed his hands over his eyes, momentarily forgetting that pressure kind of hurt at the moment with his skin being, what was it, _not fucking there._ Peter yelped when his hand made contact with the skin on his face.

Something about that seemed to break something inside of the teenager because tears started rushing down his face, and once they started, they didn’t stop.

_“Protecting the little guy.”_

What if he couldn’t do that anymore? What if people started getting hurt because he wasn’t there to help them?

He was quickly being hugged by Bruce’s arms and he let out a small sob before resting his forehead against Bruce’s chest. The man rubbed Peter’s back softly.

“It’ll be okay, Peter,” Bruce soothed.

A couple of seconds later, Tony’s voice sounded from the doorway. “Peter there’s— oh, sorry, am I interrupting something?”

Peter raised his head to look over Bruce’s shoulder and brushed away his tears. “No, that’s okay, Mr. Stark. What’s up?”

“There’s someone here to see you,” Tony said with a smirk, and stepped aside.

And there she was.

May.

She was dressed in a long-sleeved shirt and high waisted jeans. Her hair was cascading down her shoulders in long waterfalls and her glasses rested on her face neatly. Her eyes were red-rimmed and their under eyes were pink and puffy.

“Peter!” she cried. Peter leapt off the bed ran across the distance between them in record time and threw himself into her arms, immediately bursting into tears. He took in the scent of her watermelon scented perfume which he used to hate but now it smelt like everything good in the world.

May was crying, too. “Oh, my baby!” she said, bringing Peter closer if that was even possible. She planted a couple of kisses in Peter’s hair and pressed her hand against the back of Peter’s head, cradling it against her chest. “Peter,” she said, her voice hitched with sobs. Peter clung to her like he did when his parents died, gripping the back of her shirt in closed fists.

“I missed you,” Peter sobbed, and even through closed lids, tears streamed down his face.

“You have no idea,” May whispered, kissing his hair again.

“May, I think it’s best if Peter were to sleep here at the Compound tonight,” Bruce said, and May looked up. “We need to monitor his wounds in case anything happens.”

“Oh . . .” May said, not releasing Peter from her grasp. “Then I need to stay here, too.”

“Sure, that’s fine,” Tony chimed in. “There’s a couple of guest bedrooms. You can choose which ever one you want.”

“Thank you,” she said sincerely, finally releasing Peter. She looked at him up and down, studying each bandage that encircled a wound. “Peter, honey, what happened?” Her dark chocolate brown eyes continued to produce tears that spilled over her lids.

“I’m okay, May,” Peter reassured. “I’ll be fine.” _If I end up being able to stick to walls again, that is._

May stroked his hair tenderly. “I love you so much.”

“Love you too,” Peter returned.

-

Natasha honestly did not expect what just happened to work. Peter was free.

But then she ran into the one person in life who she actually missed.

Clint Barton.

He froze up, his mouth opening and closing, like he was trying to say something. Next to him was a very tall man with a clean shaven face and short hair, a dark-skinned man with a buzzcut, and an older looking man with silver hair peeking through his normal black-brown hair.

Natasha locked eye contact with him for a couple of seconds. “Clint,” she managed.

“Natasha,” he said in almost a whisper. Then the dark-skinned man clasped his hand around Clint’s bicep.

“C’mon, man, we gotta go,” he urged, tugging at Clint’s arm. The dark-skinned man had something that looked sort of like a jetpack on his back and his suit looked like it had many pieces to it. “Hurry up, we have to get back to the jet.”

Clint shook his head and snapped out of whatever daze was entranced with and succumbed to the tugging. He ran off without a single glance over his shoulder. Natasha watched him disappear from her eyeline and she sighed heavily.

Natasha turned on her heel and went to her room to pack her things, since staying here wasn’t an option anymore now that people knew where it was and what is was and what went on inside it. She stuffed her more beloved belongings into a big black duffel bag and zipped it up quickly.

Then she heard it.

“Traitor.”

Natasha’s head spun around to come face to face with Valentina with a gun in her shaky hands.

“What are you talking about? I’m packing because now people know where the base is,” Natasha said neutrally with a pounding heart.

“I _saw_ you,” Valentina snarled. “I saw you help Prisoner SM15. You’re a traitor, Natasha Romanov.” She raised the gun so it was level with Natasha’s head. “I know you also sent the Avengers a message so that they could find SM15.”

“Valentina, put the gun down,” Natasha said, spinning on her knee so she faced the angry HYDRA agent. “And just listen to me.”

“Why would I do that if you’re just going to feed me bullshit lies!” Valentina snapped, moving her finger to rest on the trigger. She reached her hand into one of the pouches around her waist and pulled it out. The device that sent the message. “If you didn’t do it, then what’s this?” The device was a small sphere, messily put together, since Natasha really didn’t have much care in making it look nice since it was probably only going to be used once.

Natasha’s blood went cold. She stood up. “He was a child.”

“So?!” Valentina exploded, her arms tensing up. “You swore an oath of loyalty and have said _‘hail HYDRA’_ at least fifty times! You can’t just do that!”

_Now or never._

Natasha abruptly swept Valentina’s feet out from underneath her and she crashed to the floor, landing hard on her back, a heavy breath bursting from her lips. Natasha slipped the gun into her hands and drew it on Valentina.

Valentina eyed the gun and gave a breathless chuckle. “So, what? You’re going to kill me?”

The gun shook in Natasha’s trembling hands. She hesitated for the slightest second, which gave Valentina enough time to slam her foot into Natasha’s calf which caused her to fall to one knee. The agent swiftly wrapped her legs around Natasha’s neck and flipped her over to the ground, causing the gun to clatter across the floor. Natasha’s head smacked against the floor which caused stars to dance about in her vision and blood to trickle down her forehead towards her hairline.

She saw Valentina groping for the gun along the floor and threw her heel against the woman’s chin and she let out a pained cry, loosening her grip just enough for Natasha to grab her legs and swing her body against the table in the room. Her head made contact with the metal leg of the table and a strangled scream came from her mouth.

Natasha scrambled across the floor to grab the gun and her fingers locked with it before Valentina’s arm went around her throat, squeezing it tight. Natasha threw her body to the side so she was facing the wall and ran up it using the support of Valentina’s arm. When her feet walked along the ceiling, Natasha flipped over Valentina’s body and fired the gun on her without hesitation this time.

The bullets sink into her body one by one, in her back, in her neck, and one on each shoulder. Valentina made a noise of pain before her body crumpled to the floor. Thick red blood made a puddle on the floor.

“Hail . . . HYDRA . . .” Valentina whispered before her body went limp.

-

Peter woke up screaming and practically drowning in his own sweat. His memory was laced with vivid details of the nightmare and he felt entangled in his blanket. He wrangled it off him and tossed it across the room.

Running his fingers through his hair, Peter tried to ground himself.

“Pete?” came a voice from the doorway.

Peter craned his neck to see Tony crossing the room and immediately drawing Peter into his chest. “Breathe, bud,” Tony said and Peter realized that his breath was barely coming out in short puffs. “Breathe with me.” Tony dramatically increase his breathing and Peter copied his chest falling and rising with his heavy breaths.

Hot tears burned Peter’s eyes and they started to spill over his lids and seep into Tony’s graphic t-shirt. When his breathing normalized after a couple of minutes, Tony gently peeled Peter off him and examined his face.

Eyeing the tears right away, Tony brought his hand to up to thumb them away. “Hey,” Tony said gently, continuing to brush away the tears while they kept falling. “Can you tell me what the nightmare was about?”

“That place,” Peter whispered, flopping his forehead against the front of Tony’s left shoulder. Tony rested his hand on Peter’s hair. “Everything about that place.”

Tony rubbed small circles on Peter’s back. “Oh, kid. I’m so sorry.”

“Where’s May?” Peter asked weakly, looking up at Tony’s eyes.

“I told her I could handle it,” Tony said, patting Peter’s shoulder. “We both woke up to your screaming and met in the hall. She was going to come in, but I told her that I had my fair share of nightmares and PTSD, so I could handle it.”

I woke them up, Peter thought with a pang of embarrassment. “O-Okay,” Peter said, putting his forehead back on Tony’s shoulder. “I’m sorry I woke you up.”

“Oh my god, kid, you’re more important than sleep,” Tony said.

“Tony?” Peter whispered, looking up at his mentor again.

“Yup?”

“Can- can I have a hug?” he asked meekly with wide eyes.

For a moment, just a moment, Tony looked like he was about to cry. But then he just nodded and wrapped his arms around Peter’s trembling figure and pulled him in tightly to his chest. Peter curled into the embrace and put his arms around Tony’s middle.

He was asleep a couple of minutes later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you guys like it?


	6. Healing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter!! Thx so much for the response to this fic. Its been amazing. <3

When Peter awoke to a beam of sunlight shining in from his window, he realized he had fallen asleep while hugging Tony, with tears pouring down his face. It usually would have embarrassed him, but this time it brought a smile to his face.

Peter curled his hands into fists around the soft blanket encircling his form for a second before swinging his legs over the side of the bed. He rummaged around in the closet and settled on some sweatpants and a t-shirt that was one size too big. He was about to walk out the door when his eyes locked on his figure in the mirror and he did a double take.

His tears hadn’t completely been wiped away from the previous night, so their tracks were dried onto his cheeks and under-eyes. His brown hair was unkempt, and its waves and curls were flopping around all over the place.

The messy curls sort of reminded Peter of MJ.

_Oh my god, MJ._

_Ned._

That made Peter sprint out of the room to find a phone or something. He bumped into Tony on the way down the hall. “Mr. Stark!” he squeaked, hopping back.

“It was first-name basis last night, kid, and now we’re back to formal?” Tony chuckled. Then his expression softened and he rested his hand on the sides of Peter’s shoulders. “How are we doing?”

“I’m fine, do you have a phone I could use?” Peter said quickly.

Tony blinked. “Uh, yeah, you can use my cell phone.” The man fished it out of his back pocket. Peter traced the Starkphone logo on the back of the device.

“Thanks, Mr. Stark,” Peter said with a smile.

“For god’s sake, call me Tony,” he said with a chuckle and shook his head.

“Okay, seeya, Mr. Stark,” Peter said and took off for his room. If he could see Tony, he’d say the billionaire was shaking his head, but smiling at the same time.

Peter did a flying leap and landed on his bed. He opened up the phone and typed Ned’s number into it. It was almost a second nature, dialing Ned’s number, since he only got a phone about a year ago sine May could only afford one recently, and before that he’d been using their home phone to call Ned.

Peter pressed the phone to his ear and anxiously drummed his fingers on his knee while the phone rang.

Then, “Hello?”

“Hey, Ned,” Peter said, happy tears forming in his eyes. “How are you doing?”

“Peter?!” Ned shrieked. “Oh my god, you’re back!”

Muffled noises rang through the phone. “Ned, are you crying?” Peter asked.

“No!” Ned said, a little breathlessly. “No. I’m just so fucking relieved. We were so worried about you. Why aren’t you using your phone? I don’t recognize this number. Hey, when can me and MJ see you? Are you coming back to school?”

“Whoa, slow down,” Peter laughed. “I’m not sure when I’m coming back to school. Probably when my injuries heal.”

“What injuries?” Ned asked. “What happened? How hurt are you? Do I need to kick someone’s ass for you?”

“So, you don’t know all the details then,” Peter murmured. Ned obviously knew something bad happened to him, but he didn’t know what exactly that bad thing was. “I . . . okay, so how do I say this? Um . . . so I was patrolling, and I had just settled on the top of a building. Not a very high one. I was going to ask Karen to check for crime when in one big motion, someone ripped off my mask and something soft and wet covered my face. I realize now that it was a rag drenched in chloroform.”

“You were _kidnapped?_ ” Ned exclaimed. “Oh my god, are you okay?”

“I’m . . .” Peter hesitated. He wasn’t okay. He was far from that yet. He probably wouldn’t be okay until his nightmares subsided and he stopped having mind-burning flashbacks and didn’t need help from Tony every time he had a nightmare. “. . . I’m recovering,” Peter said after a second.

“Peter,” Ned said softly. “How bad was it?”

Peter bit his lip hard. He hoped it wasn’t hard enough to draw blood. The mood to this conversation had flipped in two seconds. Tears slowly slid down his face one by one while he remained silent for a couple of seconds.

“Peter?” Ned said.

“It was really bad,” Peter finally said, more tears coming down. His voice was strained and his throat hurt from refrained from completely losing it. “Really, _really_ bad. They- they hurt me so much. I went to bed crying every night a-and it hurt and- and- and . . .” Peter took in a deep, heavy breath.

“I’m sorry,” Ned said, the softness in his voice returning. “If there’s anything I can do, just let me know.”

“Okay,” Peter sniveled, and wiped his face with the back of his hand. “Thanks.”

“Any time,” Ned said.

The line went dead.

 

 

About a week later, the week full of phone calls with Ned, nightmares, comfort from May and Tony, finally being allowed to come back to the apartment, Peter felt like he was ready for school. He just woke up and decided that today was the day.

Peter sauntered into the kitchen where May was already lazily making herself some coffee. Peter checked the clock on the wall. It read 9:17. Peter would be late if he went to school at this time, but at this point he didn’t really care. He could get there at lunch and find Ned and MJ.

“May?” Peter said and she turned her head, flashing him a smile.

“Hey, honey, how was your sleep?” she said cheerily, pouring her coffee into her cup.

“Do you think- do you think it would be okay if I went to school today?” Peter asked weakly, his eyes going wide.

May bit her lip. “Sweetheart . . . you really think you’re ready?”

“My hand is barely hurting any more and my gunshot wound his basically all healed up,” Peter said. “I can take the Subway, so you don’t have to drive me, and I can get there at lunch.”

May’s eyes drifted to the bandage encircling Peter’s hand and their pupils dilated.

“May, I’ll be okay,” Peter reassured, closing the distance between them and pulling his aunt into a hug. She squeezed him tightly and stroked his hair softly.

“Alright,” she said after a while. “Get your stuff together. I’ll make you a lunch.” She waved him off and turned to the cupboards and started rooting around for some lunch-ables.

Peter changed out of his sweatpants and oversized t-shirt and pulled on some jeans, a science pun t-shirt, and a Midtown hoodie. He fussed over his hair for a second before giving up trying to tame it. Peter went to the bathroom to take a shower and brush his teeth. He changed his bandage after, slightly wincing at the pain produced when he tightened it. The gunshot wound had a green flag from Bruce, so he didn’t have to wear a bandage anymore. There wasn’t even a scar. On his hand, however, the skin was recovering (his healing was working its magic and reproducing his skin cells very quickly) but what Bruce had said was true. The scarring was pretty intense. Peter had sighed every time he looked at it. He hadn’t tried practicing sticking to stuff again since it wasn’t completely fully healed. That would happen in about another couple of days time.

Peter took the subway to school, thanking May for his lunch. He was jittery the whole ride there and was even more jittery when he was crossing the field to get into the school.

Upon entering the school, Peter sighed in relief. Somehow, before he got there, he felt like the school would be different, since he’d been away from it for a while. But it was completely the same.

Peter strode down Midtown’s halls, taking in all the posters and tall blue lockers. It all felt normal.

When he made it to the cafeteria, he immediately saw Ned sitting with MJ in their usual table. Peter’s heart thumped in his chest. He had missed them so fucking much.

MJ was the one who saw him first. Her eyes widened to the size of saucers, her jaw dropped, and she tapped Ned’s shoulder repeatedly until he turned his head.   
  
“Peter!” Ned shouted. About half of the heads in the cafeteria turned their heads. A huge smile made its way onto Peter’s face as Ned jumped up from his seat and sprinted over to Peter, MJ following closely behind. Her unruly curls were bouncing about on her shoulders.

In about two seconds, Peter was yanking into the biggest hug he’d ever received from Ned. It drove the wind out of him for a second, but when he regained his breath, he threw his arms around his best friend, tears threatening to form in his eyes. MJ joined in the hug, which was a big deal for her, since Peter had never once seen her hug anyone.

“Oh my god, dude, oh my god,” Ned sputtered.

Peter released after a considerable amount of time.

MJ poked him in the arm. “Turn my way so I can hug you,” she said. Peter let out a breathless chuckle and turned to pull MJ into his arms. She rested the side of her face against the top of Peter’s shoulder. “We missed you, loser,” she said, and Peter had to laugh. Same old MJ.

When they released, Ned hugged Peter again. “Did you really miss me that much?” Peter chuckled, hugging his friend back.

“This isn’t even the half of it,” Ned said, pulling away.

During class, Peter got a couple ‘welcome backs’ from his teachers and mutual friends.

“So, what happened to your hand?” MJ said, leaning over to him during Spanish.

A surge of cold blood rushed down Peter’s body as he looked at his bandaged hand. It suddenly started to hurt. “Um . . . I . . . I don’t want to talk about it,” Peter managed, drawing his hand in towards his chest.

MJ shrugged and turned back to her work. “Whatever.”

Peter’s backpack was pretty much overflowing with work he missed out on by the time school ended, but even with the heaviness of his backpack, he felt like a huge weight had been lifted off his chest. Things were getting better.

He walked home to an empty apartment. Peter tossed his bag onto the couch and went into the kitchen to get something to eat. He groped around in the cupboard and eventually settled on a strawberry frosted Pop-Tart. Letting the squishiness of the couch hug his body, Peter scrolled through the channels on TV with the black remote in his unbandaged hand.

His mind drifted off during an episode of The Simpsons. He thought about his experience being kidnapped. He thought about his chronic nightmares and those times Tony talked him down from a panic attack and held him while he cried. Peter looked down at his hand and a strange urge to attempt to stick to the wall overcame him.

 _Might as well,_ Peter thought, peeling away the bandage with a shaky hand. The skin had almost completely reformed, but the scarring was permanent. The lacerations had left a heavy mark. Peter gently touched one of the many scars with his finger and sighed with relief when he felt no pain.

Peter stood, walked over to the wall, and with a pounding heart, rested his hand against it, still feeling to pain. Whenever he used to do this, he’d just have to will his stickiness to do its thing and then it’d work. Peter closed his eyes and did what he usually did. His heart sank when he easily pulled his hand away from the wall. It didn’t stick.

He tried again, pushing his other hand atop the hurt one and trying again. Tears sprung into his eyes, and after the fifth try, his legs gave out and he crumpled to the floor with a thump. “Why can’t things just work out for me?” Peter cried, tears rushing down his face. “For once in my life, can something good please just happen to me?”

If there was a god he believed in, he’d be praying. Heavy sobs rattled his frame as he used the wall to help himself stand.

But when he tried to pull away, he _stuck._

The crying immediately came to a stop. Peter wiped away his tears and pressed his other hand against the wall, that one sticking, too. Peter sucked in a shaky breath and pushed his feet on the wall. A triumphant laugh came from the teenager. _He was climbing again._

He scampered up to the ceiling and hung by his hand, another laugh exiting his mouth and tears of joy now running down his face. “I missed this,” he said out loud, performing a practiced front flip and landing on the carpeted floor gracefully.

Peter jumped onto the couch and immediately looked through his contacts for Tony’s phone number, eagerly tapping the call button.

The phone rang a couple of times before Tony’s voice came from the speakers. “Kid?”

“Mr. Stark,” Peter breathed. “I can . . . I can stick to stuff again!”

“Whoa, that’s great news, kiddo,” Tony said happily. “Nice job.”

“Took a bit, but I got it again,” Peter said with a huge smile plastered over his face. “So, um, do you think I can go out as Spider-Man again?”

“Hold your horses there, young buck,” Tony said. “Are you sure?”

“We-ell, I mean, I . . . I think I’m all good,” Peter sputtered, fiddling with the pillow to his left.

Tony took in a deep breath. “I’m worried about you.”

Peter felt a pang of almost guilt. “I know,” he said softly. “But I can’t not do it. People need me. And . . . and I need Spider-Man.”

It was true. Whenever he put on that mask, he felt strong. He felt like he could do anything. Even though Peter Parker is a high school student, and Spider-Man is a high school student. Spider-Man felt like his second face. His friend almost. When Tony had taken the suit away from him that one time, Peter Parker became unbearably sad. He didn’t feel like Spider-Man without it, but Spider-Man lives inside of him. He found that out when he had to use his old home-made suit that was crappy and made of a hoodie and pajama pants and had to lift a whole concrete building that was crushing him.

Tony didn’t say anything for a second. “Alright, you can do it. But send me a text every hour so I know that you’re okay.”

Peter chuckled. “Will do. Thank you, Mr. Stark.”

“I think we’re past business status,” Tony said. “So, you can call me Tony.”

Peter smiled. “Okay. Thank you, Tony.”

“Sure thing, kiddo,” the man said, and the line went dead.

Peter found his Spider-Man suit right where he’d left it, in his closet underneath his sleeping bag and soon was standing in front of his mirror, wearing it from head to toe.

He looked his alter-ego in its black and white eyes.

“You ready, Spider-Man?” he whispered to himself.

Then he took a running start and dove through his open window, catching himself before he fell with a long string of webbing.

Healing from what happened would be a long process, the process that included PTSD, nightmares, and crying, and Peter knew it.

But he also knew that that process had already begun.

 

 

**Some time later . . .**

Clint was sitting in the TV room when he heard the knock on the door. He jumped, since no one said shit about having company. And he had to admit, he was quite looking forward to alone time. As much as he adored Peter and Wanda and sometimes Steve and Tony, alone time was nice.

Muttering to himself, he waltzed over to the door and flung it open without even bothering to check through the peephole.

His eyes just about popped out of his head and he did a double take when he saw who it was.

It was Natasha.

Natasha was supporting herself against the wall with one of her hands, but the other was strewn across her body where she was applying pressure to a gunshot wound. Another two were in each of her shoulders, soaking red circles into her clothes.

“Help,” she choked out weakly before her eyes rolled back and she collapsed forward.

Clint instinctively shot out his arms to catch her, and she flopped into them.

 _Wrong time for Bruce not to be here,_ Clint thought bitterly, regretting wanting to be alone.

He gathered Natasha into his arms, avoiding the three wounds scattered over her body. He did some quick analysis and figured that the wound in her side only hit the fleshy part, so she should be fine. However, his heart was pounding like a drum in his chest as he rushed to the Medbay, and thank god it was open.

 _What the hell is she doing here?_ he thought, panicked. _Okay Clint. Treating a gunshot wound. You’ve done this before. You got this. Okay, find out if there’s an exit wound. Do that first._

Clint rolled Natasha gently over to check each of her shoulders and side for exit wounds. Clint exhaled loudly when his eyes locked on three of them. No surgery was needed. He could wrap the wounds. That would help somehow.

“Clint . . .” Natasha voice said softly.

“Hey, Nat, you’re gonna be fine,” he said, finding a bandage and a cotton ball to clean off all the dried blood. “How long ago did you get shot?”

“About an hour ago,” she said through gritted teeth. “HYDRA found me. I managed to escape with only getting shot three times in places without any organs.” She looked up to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, now’s really not the time,” Clint said dismissively, looking for scissors to cut off the sleeves on Natasha’s shirt and part of the side. He found a long silver pair and carried them over, wasting no time in cutting the fabric away from her. He found himself having to pull a little harder since the blood had caused the fabric to stick slightly. “How the hell did you get here?”

“I stole a car,” she said with a chuckle. “It was an emergency.”

Clint just rolled his eyes and cleaned off the dried blood before quickly wrapping the wounds tightly. “When Bruce gets back he can help you more.”

Natasha nodded. There was silence for a moment. “Clint, I really am sorry.”

“You helped Peter, so that kind of makes up for it, I guess,” Clint said with a sigh. “Look, I really have missed you. You were my best friend.”

“I know, and I’m sorry,” Natasha said softly. “I miss working with you and being by your side and helping you.”

“I do too,” Clint said. “Thank you for saving Peter.” He let out a sigh. “Natasha, I want you to work with me again. Do you want to join the Avengers?”

She stared at him for a long moment. It was a long shot, but she saved Peter and he missed her so much. Then she smiled. “I’d like that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hope y'all liked it. I have to admit, it was pretty hard. I'd never done a kidnapping fic before this, so I wasn't sure what to do. Also I'd never ever had Natasha's perspective so that was hard. And then school started. That ate up a huuuge chunk of my working time. Let me just say that having a set publication date on Fridays was a good idea lol. 
> 
> Anyways, this was so fun and you guys are amazing <3

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave reviews. I love hearing what you lovely people have to say. Imma update every Friday, so stay tuned ;)


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